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British Polythene Industries (BPI) has become the latest major plastic packaging group to raise prices to counter "unrelenting" increases in polymer costs.

BPI, which produces polythene films, bags and sacks, said it would raise the prices of all its UK products by up to £100 per tonne because the price of polymer had reached "unprecedented levels" following increases in December and the weakness of sterling against the Euro.

The Greenock-based group also said it had been affected by rising energy and transport costs. Combined with polymer price rises throughout 2007, this had "forced BPI to review its selling prices across all products", said chief executive John Langlands.

"We operate in a focused and cost-effective manner but we cannot absorb this level of price increases," he said.

BPI has followed rigid plastics group RPC in raising prices. In December, RPC also cited "unrelenting" rises in input costs when it announced a 5% increase in prices from 1 January 2008.

RPC chief executive Ron Marsh said the prices of nearly every component of the group's cost structure had risen in 2007, and margins had "contracted to a level we can no longer tolerate".